Warriors Name Squad For Lightning IP20 Match

“SCA” TO MISS OUT ON LIGHTNING T20

The cricket weekend starts early this time with a massive game in the Hanley Energy T20 Interprovincial Cup taking place on Friday at Bready (5 pm) between the North West Warriors and Leinster Lightning.

Ian McGregor’s charges have hit the ground running this summer and go into the contest knowing that a win over the tournament favourites and current holders would give them a real live chance of winning the title at next month’s T20 Blitz at Pembroke.

So far this season Andy McBrine’s team has drawn their opening 3-day game in Dublin before recording a 50-over win over the Knights as well as T20 verdicts against both the NCU and Munster. It is a record McGregor is more than happy with, and he acknowledges the part that his new additions have played in that success.

“We have two new players in our squad this year in William Porterfield and Boyd Rankin- both born and bred North West lads. It is fantastic for all of us to have them both playing together when we can, but William will hopefully be playing most matches for us across all formats, and you can see the influence he has for us both on and off the pitch.”

“It’s a very under-stated influence, but it gives the lads such a lift to have him in the side. Andy McBrine is happy to use William’s experience on the field as well, and you can see how the rest of the players are thinking about their game more. That’s what we were after when William came in, and the players are finding the confidence to be part of it.”

The Head Coach will have to do without one such player on Friday night; Bready skipper Davy Scanlon has undoubtedly grabbed his Warriors opportunity with both hands; however, he will miss the Lightning game due to back problems.

“I spoke with “Sca” at the Under-17 game on Sunday and considering that we have a couple of weeks’ break after Friday night we’ve agreed that he sits this one out to give himself a better chance of making the 50-over and 3-day matches towards the end of the month. That said however I would envisage few changes other than a replacement for him. We’ve found a formula that works for now, so there’s no point in changing it if we don’t need to”.

David will be replaced by Donemanas William McClintock.

Reluctant to single out any of his players, Ian did accept when asked, that the current form of Stuart Thompson was also a big part of the Warriors success thus far.

“He has been immense. He came back at the start of the season having worked with Adi Birrell in South Africa and has looked a different player. Everybody knew he had quality, but we wanted to see him go back to his club and post numbers and he has done that. The next step was to do it at Interpro, and he’s done that too. People then saw for themselves as he took wickets and made a half-century at Test level so yes, Stuart is now showing the type of form to suggest that he can go on to become a key player at the International level over the next ten years.”

The North West Warriors Squad

Andrew McBrine (c)

Andrew Britton

William Porterfield

Ricky Lee Dougherty (wk)

Stuart Thompson

David Rankin

Aaron Gillespie

Ross Allen

William McClintock

Craig Young

Graham Kennedy

Ryan MacBeth

Admission to Friday night’s game at Bready is free, and the North West would encourage the local cricket public to come along and show their support.